McCollum adjusts to life without ‘Doughnut Brother’
May 28th, 2007 | by Kevin Morris |
By
ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH
From the very genesis of their tenure with the Rams, Andy McCollum and Adam
Timmerman were overshadowed.
On Feb. 15, 1999, a day after Timmerman was signed as a free agent, the Rams
picked up St. Louisan Trent Green and pronounced him their starting
quarterback. Exactly two months later — and just 48 hours after McCollum
agreed to a free-agent deal — the Rams made another splash by trading for
Colts running back Marshall Faulk.
“Offensive linemen,” McCollum said with a smile. “None of us are the stars of
the team.”
Maybe not, but McCollum and Timmerman still played key roles in the sudden
offensive surge that helped the Rams earn two Super Bowl berths and one
championship.
For seven seasons, they lined up together, Timmerman at right guard and
McCollum at either left guard or center. Off the field, the fun-loving
“Doughnut Brothers” enjoyed a tight bond: It was rare to see one without the
other at Rams Park; they were roommates on the road, and their families
often vacationed together.
They even mirrored each other in size, both listed at 6 feet 4 and 300 pounds.
They came in together, and they wanted to go out together. “That would be the
ideal thing, to spend the last season playing side by side,” Timmerman said.
That ambition began to unravel in the second quarter of opener last year vs.
Denver, when McCollum, who hadn’t missed a game with the Rams, suffered a
season-ending knee injury.
In Week 10, Timmerman broke three ribs at Carolina. He took one snap off to
catch his breath, then re-entered the game. He mustered through the next three
weeks, but his consecutive-games streak of 184 came to an end when coach Scott
Linehan inactivated him Dec. 17 at Oakland.
Timmerman, 35, was released in February. He hasn’t caught on with another team
yet.
Meanwhile, McCollum, 36, not only is attempting to come back from a major
injury and for the first time in several years is facing a serious challenge to
his job, he’s also having to adjust to NFL life without Timmerman at his side.
“Going out on the field without Adam is strange,” McCollum said. “We’ve been
playing together for a long time.”
Even stranger, he said, is not having Timmerman keeping the atmosphere loose in
meetings and attacking the chow line with him.
“We don’t have his bad jokes going in the meetings all the time now. I
definitely miss that,” McCollum said. “And his eating ability . . . no one
really can eat food like Adam could. He’s hard to replace as an eating partner;
no one wants to eat with the old man.”
But the oddest experience was seeing rookie center Dustin Fry wearing a jersey
with 62 -– Timmerman’s old number -– on it during organized team activities.
“They put him in 62’s locker, too. That was really weird,” McCollum noted.
Still, friendship is one thing, and career is another. McCollum realizes that
he has little time to weep for his pal if he intends to be the Rams’ first-team
center. Brett Romberg, who filled in admirably late in the season after Richie
Incognito shifted to right guard, also is gunning for that spot. “I think it’s
going to be a great battle,” Linehan said.
“They say you don’t lose your job to injury, but that only applies to people
with the name of Marshall, Isaac or something like that. We all know that,”
McCollum said. “Brett plans on winning it, and I plan on winning it and getting
my job back. So, how it works out, it’ll work out. We’ll just do our best.”
McCollum, who reported that his knee “feels 100 percent out there,” said his
time on the sideline gave him a renewed appreciation for his vocation.
“It’s highly motivational, I believe, when you take a year off involuntarily,”
he said. “I wasn’t happy about sitting out last year, and it motivates you to
come back and train that much harder, get back on the field and try to have
some fun out there.”
Even with someone else wearing No. 62. “I wish it could’ve worked out
differently,” McCollum said. “But that’s the way the business goes.”
